Thursday, November 1, 2012

The sites are very well
known and very profitable ones. Google Inc(NASDAQ:GOOG), Twitter, Facebook
Inc(NASDAQ:FB) and other such sites are facing the scrutiny of the government
in UK, over the tax arrangements which they have going on. The companies are
being criticized for lacking social responsibility towards the country, and
they are being pressurized into making sure that they contribute enough towards
the anti-bullying measures in the cyber world. Helen Goodman, who is a Labour
MP, brought up this topic during a debate in the Westminster Hall. This debate,
which took place on Wednesday, saw Goodman pointing at the big names because of
the extra money which the advent of these sites was leading the government to
pay. She said that the government was being forced to shell out huge sums of
money to deal with threats and harassment online.

She talked about how
this was an issue which not only affected the country economically, but also
shed light on the lack of responsibility of these big sites, in terms of social
welfare. Their lack of prudence is what was driving the government to spend a
lot on safety measures, and it was time that the system cracked down on them to
ensure that this flow of money in the wrong direction be stopped. She talked
about the depression of profits through artificial means, and she also pointed
out at the royalty which was paid by the UK branch of Google to the main body
of the search giant. She also pointed at the low tax figures of the different
companies, with Twitter paying no tax at all. She said that Google paid very
little tax as compared to what the company made. And she also stated that the
country would no longer accept the replacement of the tax with minor social
responsibility.

A hearing has been
scheduled for Monday, for the big names of Starbucks, Google, as well as
Amazon. This will be held with the public accounts committee, and they tax
inspectors shall also be present during the meeting. The meeting might be
rescheduled though, on account of Matt Brittin Google’s UK managing director,
not being able to be present on that date.